Tigers' Rickey McGill, Kai Mitchell were stars as freshmen

10:47 PM,
Nov. 29, 2013

Written by

Dan DeFrancesco

As Spring Valley athletic director Bill Pilla draped banners he purchased for the basketball program's 1,000-point scorers in the winter of 2012, he arrived at a daunting realization. Pilla had a tough enough time raising money for the seven banners due to the district's tightening budget. The play of then-freshmen Kai Mitchell and Rickey McGill, the Tigers' top two scorers that season, indicated his troubles were far from over.

"I was like, wow, I'm going to have to figure out a way in three years to get a couple more banners," Pilla said. "I thought we had something there."